Ditch Doc

There’s this idea that Catholics have a lot of kids because they like to consummate their marriages as much as anyone else, but aren’t allowed to use artificial contraceptives, children being the necessary but unintended result. This is backwards. Catholic families are large because Catholics, and the Church, are just nuts about children. A Catholic couple gets married, and consummates their marriage, in order to have kids. On purpose! The teaching against contraception, while perfectly serious, is almost an afterthought, the way it’s an afterthought that when it’s day, it can’t be night.

Another thought on babies. At the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington in 1994, Mother Teresa said, in reference to abortion: “Please don’t kill the child. I want the child. Give the child to me.” But consider: she lived among the poorest of the poor, and was one herself. So by saying what she did, she was saying that a life of abject poverty from birth is better than no life at all. It’s a direct challenge to the Western idea that third world babies should be aborted to save them from poverty, and it’s from the mouth of someone who lives there.

And another thing: the UN, Planned Parenthood and any other child-reducing agency you want to name all defend their actions by saying that if we keep having too many kids, we’ll increase world poverty. Our defense is often “No we won’t. There’s plenty of wealth in the world, it’s just misdistributed.” True, at least for the time being. But here’s another one, perhaps a more fundamental statement of our position: “Maybe someday increased population will make the average human being poorer. Maybe a lot poorer. But human life makes it worthwhile to live in poverty. We’re supposed to lay down our lives for our friends, so we’d better be willing to give up food, shelter, and clothing for the lives of our children.”

Sometimes, we say that the purpose of having kids is to continue the human race. While this is undeniably true, I wonder if the main reason might be to give life to this child, and that one… That would explain the disparity between the Catholic tendency to have lots of kids and the secular Western tendency to prevent having them, or get rid of them before they become a “problem.” Catholics love their children even before they’re born, and bring them into the world for their own good. Since this love for each child is unaltered by the number of previous children, good Catholic parents will never say, “man that one was too many.” Many irreligious parents, on the other hand, have the idea that they’re just perpetuating the race, and that if they have more than two kids, they’ll be throwing off the status quo.

Please check out this guy’s blog. A very insightful exploration of the ethical questions brought up by modern medicine and the abuse thereof. Better yet, concrete answers to said questions!

I’m becoming certain that we’ll make a much bigger impact on the abortion front by letting people know what we think without being asked. So here’s a belated Canadian election complaint: Of all the issues Mr. Harper could have promised to leave alone if his party were elected, why abortion? Has legalized abortion become a defining fact of our country’s identity? We’re always letting ourselves go off on the good things that make us Canadian: we didn’t go to Iraq, we love peacekeeping, we think everyone should have access to excellent medical care, there’s no death penalty, we don’t have racial segregation, women can vote. But right up there, in some people’s minds, is the fact that if we really think it’ll be good for her, we’re willing to kill a woman’s child. Mr. Harper and Mr. Martin might disagree on a lot of things, but it must be an indication of some kind of national unity that they agree on the fundamentals.

My anatomy and physiology textbook includes a thorough, well written chapter explaining the perfection with which female and male bodies are designed to have children together. It then lists most of the ways you can interfere with the process. It does mention the possibility of a natural, uncontracepted married relationship, but contrary to the impression you might get from the first part of the chapter, it’s not an excellent way to have a baby, 85% successful within the first year. It’s just a very ineffective means of contraception, with an 85% rate of failure.